


til the stars go blue

by toxica939



Category: Emmerdale
Genre: Implied/Referenced Suicide attempt, M/M, Mental Health Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-23
Updated: 2017-04-23
Packaged: 2018-10-23 03:58:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,679
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10711725
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/toxica939/pseuds/toxica939
Summary: Aaron looks away. There's a piece of fluff caught in the stubble on his cheek and Robert stares at it until his eyes water. If this is it, he wants to remember everything.ORRobert has a breakdown and this is the aftermath.





	til the stars go blue

 

It's raining when Robert gets discharged. Of course it is, what else would it do?

Vic picks him up. Her eyes are worried and she's chewing her lip. Robert can't blame her, he knows what he looks like, worn paper thin and fraying around the edges.

“You alright?” she asks.

Robert gives her a look. He's not really, but he's alive. That'll have to do for now.

They're quiet in the car, just the sound of rain and the wipers thumping. He watches Vic open her mouth to say something six times before she find the words.

“Are they sure you're okay to come home? You still seem pretty out of it.”

Robert nods. He is. He can feel the person he used to be but it's like a coat that doesn't fit right, he can't seem to put it back on.

“I'll be fine,” he tells her.

He can see her frown, not convinced. Robert wishes he didn't feel the same way.

They're quiet for a while longer before she cracks again.

“Aaron wanted to come,” she says, voice bright. False. “I told him you asked me to come on my own but he's waiting for you at home.”

It's like an ice bath, like being back in that lake. Robert can't breathe right. “I can't face him. Not yet.”

“What? Robert he loves you. He's been worried sick, especially when you wouldn't let anyone visit.”

Robert doesn't want Aaron to worry about him. He doesn't want Aaron to think about him at all.

He doesn't say anything in the end, can't make his mouth work.

They stop at a red light and she looks over at him, hands at ten and two like dad taught them. “You know I love you right?” she asks. “You know that, don't you?”

Robert nods. He can't feel it, but rationally he knows she has to love him at least half as much as he loves her. That's more than enough.

He rests his head against the window when they pull off, suddenly exhausted. Watches it rain.

::

He wakes up on Vic's sofa to a bright afternoon, nothing like the morning's weather. Aaron's sat on the coffee table, forearms across his knees, watching him.

Most of Robert wants to pretend to go back to sleep. Seeing Aaron again hurts everywhere. Along his bones and into his chest. It's nothing more than he deserves.

“Hiya,” Aaron says. His voice sounds like he's been crying but his eyes aren't red.

“What are you doing here?” It's not what Robert means to say, but his filter doesn't really work at the moment.

Aaron's smile is sad. “Where else would I be? You didn't come home.”

Robert doesn't know what to say to that. He can't lie to Aaron, not again. “I don't have a home.” It sounds pathetic even to his own ears. The lady at the hospital - Sarah, as if that wasn't just another kick in the teeth - had said he needed to stop projecting his own feelings about himself on to other people. This doesn't feel like that.

But Aaron looks like he's just taken a punch. “Are you joking me? You're my _husband_.”

Not legally, Robert thinks, doesn't say. Because that doesn't make it any less of a blow. “You shouldn't call me that.”

Aaron looks away. There's a piece of fluff caught in the stubble on his cheek and Robert stares at it until his eyes water. If this is it, he wants to remember everything.

“I thought Vic was joking,” Aaron says in the end, he sounds baffled. “You actually think we've split up don't you?”

“We have.” Robert knows that, it's all he's thought about for weeks. Trying to accept a life without Aaron. It's harder than letting go of Elliot was, obviously or he wouldn't be in this mess, but he's getting there. It's not any kind of life, it's just the one Robert's got.

“Says who?” Aaron demands. “You? You want to split up?”

“What? No,” Robert scrambles into a sitting position. He needs Aaron to know this isn't his fault, this is all on Robert. “Of course not. But I understand-”

“You don't understand anything,” Aaron spits standing up. He's going to leave now and Robert will have to start again at finding a way to make that okay. Robert can't look away from him, he can't do it.

Aaron takes Robert's chin in his hand, leans down until their mouths could touch, it doesn't make any sense. “This isn't over,” he says. “Come and find me when you're ready to talk okay? I don't want to make this any worse. I'll wait.”

Robert wants to tell him that this is as bad as it can get. But they'd both know that was a lie.

::

He doesn't go near the pub. Chas made it very clear last time he saw her that he wasn't welcome. Robert thinks that's fair.

The problem is that there aren't a lot of other places to go. Especially when he's putting so much effort into avoiding Aaron.

He ends up walking the fields mostly. It's nice to be out in the air, makes him feel alive in a way the weeks in hospital never could. Even after they'd decided he probably wasn't a risk to himself he still wasn't exactly encouraged to go for a wander.

Luckily the hills around Emmerdale stretch for miles. Robert walks until his feet hurt. Breath after breath of cold, clean air; a hint of spring if you're looking for it.

He hears her coming from half a mile off, doesn't look over at her until she settles into step beside him, pony tail swinging. It must be difficult for her to keep up with his pace but he can't slow down.

“Are you trying to take up all of Aaron's bad habits or something?” she asks.

Robert almost laughs. She's one to talk.

She grabs his arm when it's clear he's not going to say anything, pulls until he has no choice but to stop. Her cheeks are red. Robert makes himself look at the hills rolling over her shoulder instead.

“You don't deserve Aaron,” she says, annoyed.

She's right, so Robert nods.

“You know he's going mad, not being able to see you. You're hurting him _again_.”

“I haven't gone near him,” Robert assures her. He wouldn't.

She shouts, pushes him in the chest until he stumbles. “Why aren't you listening? That's the problem you fucking moron. He _wants_ to see you and I know you want to see him. You're not that bloody tapped yet. Pull yourself together.”

She's striding away before his brain can catch up.

“Liv,” he calls out, doesn't expect her to stop.

She put her hands on her hips and raises both eyebrows. She's Aaron through and through. As much Aaron's as Robert has ever been. Looking at her is hard, now.

“I'm sorry.”

“Then fix it. Get your head out of your backside and talk to Aaron.”

If only it were that simple.

::

Rebecca's coming out of the cafe. She's got Elliot in the car seat Robert paid for, swinging from her arm. Shock of dark hair and his father's eyes.

Robert can't do this now.

He walks away before she has chance to spot him, doesn't know what else to do.

::

Aaron answers the door with a tea towel over his shoulder. Robert wishes that didn't make his heart twist.

It doesn't help that Aaron lights up either. Robert's starting to get that Aaron hasn't written him off completely yet but it's so difficult to adjust to the idea. He spent weeks talking through how to make the best of it. No one ever suggested he wouldn't need to, it hadn't even been a consideration.

Aaron leads him to the kitchen, offers him a drink. It's awkward in a way they've never been and Robert relishes it. Liv was wrong, he is tapped.

“I'm glad you came,” Aaron offers in the end. Because that's how Aaron is, generous to a fault, heart too big for his body. Anybody who thinks Aaron is closed off has never shared a bed with him, never shared a life. Robert hates himself for doing this to him.

“Liv had a word,” Robert says. Thinks that sounds enough like him that Aaron will buy it.

But Aaron knows him better than that.

“You coming home yet?” Aaron asks. His face tells Robert he already knows the answer to that so Robert keeps quiet.

Aaron sighs. “You've got to talk to me Robert.”

Robert doesn't know if he can. He wants to look at his feet. “I'm sorry,” he starts, because it's as good a place as any. “What I did, I know I can't take it back. I know it's unforgivable.”

The creases between Aaron's eyebrows deepen. “What are you talking about?”

Robert doesn't want to say it but he owes Aaron that much. “Rebecca.”

Aaron's mouth drops open. “I don't care about Rebecca. She's nothing. I'm not talking about Rebecca.”

Robert doesn't understand and it clearly shows.

“You tried to kill yourself, Robert,” he shouts, an explosion. “You tried to leave me. Here. With this mess.”

Robert shakes his head, feels wrung out all over again. This isn't how he thought this was going to go. “I thought you'd already gone.”

“Well that's your problem isn't it?” Aaron spits. “Always deciding what I should do and how I should feel. You never gave me chance to decide anything.”

Robert's at a loss. There's nothing he can do to make this right, there wasn't then and there isn't now. The truth coming out, the real truth and everything that came after – it doesn't change what he did.

“I'm sorry,” he says, helpless. “I know I've ruined everything.”

“Robert,” Aaron sounds broken now. “That was for me to decide. If you'd just been honest with me from the start-”

Robert cuts him off. “I know.”

There's no point going over all this again. Aaron knows why he didn't say anything until it was too late, he knows why Robert let it get so far. It was even worth it to get Aaron the help he needed. Robert would do it again. Aaron finding himself again is the only part of all of this Robert doesn't regret.

“You don't know! I could have told you not to believe a word she said. I could have _helped_ you.”

Robert wants to laugh, remembering Aaron's face when he found out, the things he'd said. If he'd told Aaron back then, before his head was on straight, it wouldn't have been Robert they had to fish out of the lake.

“You couldn't,” Robert says. He was beyond help, even then.

Aaron looks like he's thinking about coming closer for a minute but he doesn't. Stays on the other side of the counter. “You didn't give me a chance. Give me some credit here, Robert. After everything we've been through, you really thought I'd just give up on you?”

That's exactly what Robert had thought. When he'd told Aaron, when there hadn't been any choice anymore because he'd gotten the call from Rebecca, that it was time; and he couldn't keep pretending anymore that he wasn't about be someone's dad. When Aaron had walked away. That's exactly what he'd thought.

He hadn't thought he had anything else to lose when he'd driven to the hospital that night.

That sounds like a joke now. That he'd thought that was rock bottom.

“I don't know what you want me to say,” Robert tells him. Honesty is the only thing he has left.

Aaron scrubs his hands over his face. Looks furious and hopeless and like he has no idea how they got here. Robert knows the feeling.

“Can we just,” Aaron shrugs. “Have a brew and sit down, maybe? I didn't actually ask you over here to argue.”

Robert nods. He'll give Aaron anything he needs, if it means he gets to stay here a little longer.

::

The sun's almost completely gone now but they haven't turned on any lights. Aaron is a warm weight beside him on the sofa, painted in shades of grey.

Robert puts his cup of cold, half drunk tea on the coffee table. “She told me he was mine.”

Aaron nods.

“Maybe she thought he was. I don't know.”

“She didn't,” Aaron says, like he knows.

It doesn't matter anymore, he's tired of being angry with her, it doesn't get him anywhere. He tells Aaron as much.

“It does matter. She lied to you for months, she made you think you were going to have a son.”

Robert has to close his eyes. “Don't.”

Aaron pulls a knee up under himself and turns to face Robert. “I wish you'd told me. I'm sorry that you didn't think you could.”

Now that hurts. “Don't apologise to me. I cheated. _I_ lied to _you_ for months. Just because he's not mine, it doesn't change what I did. I still slept with her.”

He feels sick saying it but he can't let Aaron kid himself.

Aaron quirks an eyebrow. “Remember that do you?”

Robert's not an idiot. He knows what Aaron's getting at, had to talk about it enough in the hospital. “You're kidding yourself if you think that makes it okay.”

Aaron sighs. “Stop telling me how I feel.” He sounds pissed off again now. That's easier for Robert to take than the stilted tenderness.

“You're better off without me,” Robert tells him. He might not wish he was dead anymore, the he still knows that's true. It's probably always been true.

Aaron fits a palm to Robert's cheek, tilts his head until their eyes meet. It's awful, making Aaron cry.

“I'm not,” Aaron says. “I've tried it. I tried it when Chrissie found out, I tried it in prison, I tried it the last few weeks and I'm _not_. I can't just give up on you, _I've tried_ and it doesn't work. _I_ don't work without you,” he taps his free hand against his chest. “You're in here. You always have been.”

It doesn't make sense. He's saying everything Robert feels, right down to bones, but his messed up head doesn't know how to accept that it's true. He knows Aaron loves him. He just doesn't understand why anymore.

“You're still wearing your wedding ring,” is what he says. Because that's the one tangible thing he can see to explain the feeling growing wings in his belly. He'd noticed it straight away but he hadn't known what it meant until now.

Aaron nods, tipping their foreheads together. “Of course I am.”

Robert takes a deep breath, feels light and heavy at the same time. Feels hope.

::

He keeps walking. Not to punish himself, no matter what people think, but because it helps. He gets why Aaron runs now.

It makes his head feel clear in a way it hasn't been for months.

Aaron comes with him sometimes. Matches him stride for stride and doesn't expect him to talk. It's not something Robert ever thought he'd enjoy about Aaron, his panache for extended silences. But they're learning new ways to be with each other now.

It's comfortable. It fits.

::

It's a Sunday when he moves back into the Mill for good. All his stuff was there the whole time. Hell, _he's_ been there more often that not, but it's official now.

Aaron shakes his head as he watches Robert put the key back on his keyring. “I can't believe you actually took that off.”

“It was symbolic,” Robert says. He'd done lots of stupid stuff like that in the days before it all went down. Like if he made sure he had nothing, it would be easier. He's not sure if it worked.

Aaron stops by the kitchen table where Robert's sitting, puts a hand in his hair and, quite literally, gives Robert's head a wobble. “You're an idiot.”

Robert nods. “I think that's been established. Not a mental patient anymore though,” he points out. He's still going to see someone, but it's out of choice now.

“You'll always be a mental patient to me Rob,” Liv announces. She's shrugging on a jacket and her voice is fond. It's been a slow thaw, Aaron says Robert scared her a lot, that's she's lost enough. It's another thing to feel guilty about, another weight on his shoulders. It's actually worse now, the guilt, now that he can feel himself again.

“Thanks Liv,” he knows he sounds too sincere but she's kind enough to ignore it. Blows him a sarcastic kiss on her way out the door.

“She's coming round,” Aaron says. His hand is still his Robert's hair. “Told you.”

“She's been amazing.” She's got an uncanny way of knowing when Robert's thoughts start drifting to places they shouldn't, always has a sharp word to pull him back. She'll watch films with him when he can't sleep and she hasn't once brought up that time he found out he wasn't anybody's dad and drove his car into a lake. There are a lot of things Robert doesn't know how to thank that girl for.

Aaron presses a kiss to his forehead, the sort of soft affection Robert's letting himself earn these days, letting himself accept. Robert hooks a finger through Aaron's belt loop, keeps him close.

They don't say anything else for a while.

::

If Liv is a slow thaw, Chas is like trying to melt the polar ice caps.

When they finally brave the pub together, an exercise in being watched by everyone they know, she slaps a pint down in front of him without a word. It's busy in the pub, but not that busy. He can see Aaron give her a sharp look out the corner of his eye, can see her ignore it.

“Thanks,” Robert says. She's the only one who'll treat him like he deserves. It actually makes him quite enjoy being around her. Aaron would call that self harm, so Robert's not going to mention it. It's a vague enjoyment anyway, he doesn't hate himself quite the way he did.

“Mum,” Aaron hisses. “We've been through this.”

Chas rolls her eyes. “Just because you're a soft touch doesn't mean I have to play along. You can't just try and off yourself so everyone forgets what a waste of space you are.”

It's everything Robert's been thinking and he holds his breath, suddenly terrified to have it pointed out to Aaron.

“That what you said about me is it?” Aaron asks, voice dark. His eyes are dangerous.

Chas visibly deflates. “No love,” she looks uncomfortable. “That's different.”

“It's really not.”

Robert can't stand this. “Aaron it's fine, I get it.”

Aaron huffs, props an elbow on the bar, pinches the bridge of his nose like he's getting a headache. “Well I don't. You're hardly the only person here to get off your face and do something stupid,” he glares at Chas. “Is he?”

“He hurt you,” Chas says. “He made me lie to you.”

“He hurt himself. And he didn't make you do anything,” Aaron drops his voice, leans in further. “I've forgiven him. I've forgiven him worse and so have you. So move on, he's not going anywhere.”

Robert looks down at the bar, fingers wet where his glass is sweating. It makes his face burn to have Aaron stick up for him, makes his chest swell with something like pride. It's been a long time since he felt that.

Chas cuts her eyes at him. “You better swear to me you will never do anything like that again.”

“Never,” it's the easiest promise Robert's ever made.

She nods, mulling it over. “Then I suppose I could try to be civil, if that's what Aaron wants.”

Robert's face wants to smile but he keeps it in check. “I'll take civil.”

Chas nods again, points a finger of warning at them both as she moves away to serve someone else.

“She wasn't wrong,” Robert tells Aaron, nudging their shoulders together. He can't avoid it anymore. “I shouldn't get a pass just because I...” he doesn't know which word to use.

“It's not about that,” Aaron tells him. “I love you,” he says, like that explains everything.

Maybe it does.

Robert keeps their shoulders pressed together while he drinks his beer. Maybe if Aaron can love him enough for both of them for a bit, just until he's himself again. Maybe he'll be okay.

::

It's better at night. When they're in bed together and it's quiet. They curl up on Robert's side of the bed, Aaron's head on Robert's pillow, sharing breath.

Robert lets his hands run over Aaron's back, feels Aaron's chest against his own, Aaron's fingers on the back of his neck.

Sometimes it feels like if they can just lie here for long enough, nothing else will exist. Sometimes it feels like nothing else does.

“You seemed better today,” Aaron murmurs. Robert can feel his eyelashes flutter, a tickle on his cheek.

“I had fun,” Robert tells him and it's not even a little bit of a lie.

Some awful village fate Laurel and Marlon had put together in memory of Ashley. The sun had come out especially and Robert had spent the day alternating between following Aaron around like a puppy and getting in Vic's way at the food van.

Ross had been there, Elliot on his hip. Robert had nodded to him, like there were no hard feelings. It was bullshit but it made him feel better.

Aaron had bought him a toffee apple. Had kissed the taste of caramel from his mouth. It had been a good day.

Aaron draws in a deep breath through his nose, hums contentedly. “I missed you,” he says.

Robert know exactly what he means.

He presses forward for a kiss, points his toes in the sheets and feels himself taking up every inch of space inside his skin, says, “Me too.”

It'll be summer again soon. A whole world of possibility.

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> join me on tumblr, i'm vckaarrob


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